http://www.spiegel.de/
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
Should we do anything about racist people?
http://www.spiegel.de/
Wednesday, August 28, 2013
Comparing Diminishes Happiness
The problem is once you get into that habit of comparing it will never end, today you will want more money than Tom, tomorrow you will want a car bigger than Dicks and then you will want a job or wife better than Harry's. Oh, but it doesn't end there; then you want to be faster than Bolt, sexier than [who ever is considered sexy these days] or as powerful as the American president. Some of the things, you will be able to achieve, others you wont be able to. In either case however, if your initial motivation was derived from comaparism it wont give you any lasting happiness. The later situation is obvious; if you cant become as sexier than Scarlet Johansson you are gonna feel the pain of your your constructed sexy-lessness if not uglyness for as long as you keep comparing! (I remember Scarlet being on some list last year; probably it has changed but you get my point). In the former scenario, if you are able to become as powerful as the American president, maybe you will start envying Gadafi for all the young girls that he got to sleep with (or as we now know, raped!) and sleep with your secretary!
Anyhow, I guess you get my point; We need to stop comparing if we want to be truly happy and free. That does not mean you should not want more or strive to be better, or have the need to earn more or keep in shape. All I am saying is comparison shouldn't be the driving force behind your motivation to do all those things. We can only be free once we stop comparing.
I know its hard and thats because we are hard wired in such a way but if you remind yourself to take a step back and rethink every time a situation arises where you can see that comparison plays a part in you motivation to want that thing or to want more. Yes, retract your initial motivation, recoil even if you are sure the motivation was out of comparison and then ask yourself do you really want that thing (or more of that thing). Take Tom, Dick or Harry out of the picture, then do you really want it? If yes, then go for it!
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2007/04/04/the-joy-of-economics.html
Monday, March 31, 2008
Pakistani Students in Singapore - an overview
Number of Students
NUS: 100+
NTU: 15+
SMU: 1
Total: approx 130
Male:female ratio is approximately 10:1
The number of Pakistani students coming to
Many such students do not know anything about
as StudentS in
The higher proportions of Pakistani Undergraduates here are enrolled in Engineering with the exception of a few in Social Sciences and Business. It is so because technical fields such as engineering are looked at highly amongst the Pakistani students’ families as well as in the Pakistani society as a whole. Engineering is considered more professional a field according to the old school of thought. The boys, especially, are not expected to get into unconventional fields like arts or designing. Moreover, engineering schools of NUS and NTU have a high ranking as compared to other universities in the world, which is why it is also considered prestigious to study here.
According to students, studies here are elusive, tougher and harder with an immense competition by the mainland Chinese students who dominate in academics, because of this immense amount of pressure, they are always consumed by their studies, thus leaving little time for leisure. When they compare themselves to their friends in the West who are mostly enjoying themselves with alot of time for leisurely activities, whilst still doing well in their studies, they sometimes regret coming to
In
Keeping the religious issues aside there are a lot of cultural differences between the Singaporean community and the Pakistani community and a few even with the larger South Asian community here which the Pakistanis want to emphasize upon as they are a minority here. But the most significant is the issue of race and nationality, because most of the Pakistanis are brought up in a very nationalistic environment. Like any other nation, nationalism is forged through a number of tools that the government uses. Pakistanis therefore see themselves as a distinct race, a Pakistani race. This is a big problem as they have a great number of attributes which are similar to other south Asians such as Afghanis, Bangladeshis and most importantly Indians, especially the north Indians which is why they want to emphasize on their differences even more. As Indians have been present here for such a long time and most of the south Asians here are Indians it is quite easy for them to over shadow the small and similar Pakistani community. It is therefore very common for a Pakistani to be called an Indian or a Bengali. In many cases people here don’t even know where
To help the Pakistani students, PakNUS, a Pakistani student society was formed 3 years ago, with the idea of providing a common ground to the Pakistani students, during and after their stay at NUS. Apart from being a platform for Pakistanis to raise their collective concerns to the university administration, the society’s aim is to represent Pakistan positively and to support interaction with the different communities at NUS in particular and other universities in Singapore so that people can understand Pakistanis in a better way and realize them as distinguishable from other South Asian communities.
We can see that just as the other new South Asians coming here from
Though in some aspects there are exceptions, after some observation and interviews we have found out that even though a lot of Pakistanis stay close to their Pakistani community here but have a female companion (girl friend) who is Singaporean, Malay, Indian, or of some other nationality. This is mainly because of a huge difference in the male to female ratio; in NUS there are about a 100 plus Pakistani students in different faculties, mainly in Engineering out of which only about 8 to 10 are female students. This can be an important point as far as their assimilation into the Singaporean community is concerned because most of them are bonded with
Many students have a really good perception of the
CAUSES AND IMPACTS OF THE RECENT INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF PAKISTANI STUDENTS COMING TO
By contacting the Pakistani alumni, we found out that not many Pakistanis were coming to
This increase has in turn helped the Pakistani community grow not just in numbers but also in terms of recognition of their culture, language (Urdu) and other common issues. Furthermore, it has strengthened the Pakistani community here and hence there is more support for the Pakistanis especially the students, who can get help from the seniors and graduates be it emotional, academic or monetary. Last but not the least it gives them a greater sense of belonging.